tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Feb 26 10:31:53 1995

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Re: Suggestions of new words

A.Appleyard wrote:
>I have run these new words through my analyser, and they seem to be thus:-

You certainly went to a lot of trouble, sir.  I salute your effort.
However... it's just going to encourage more of this sort of thing.
Actually, I'm not surprised that you're taking the suggestions seriously.
You seem to propose a need for "a new suffix" or "a new verb" occasionally
yourself!  Okay, I did it once (or twice) myself... but I was given a
good flogging and I am the better for it.

Some of WestphalWz's proposals are simply things one might put in a personal
annotated dictionary, such as {juvwI'} "meter" or {QobHa'} "be safe", and
some are legitimate noun-noun constructions that most readers of the Klingon
language would be expected to understand, like {SeStlhegh} "vapor trail".  Fine.

But many are truly novel combinations, like {paqchel} "appendix" ["book(n) add(v)"]
or {Qongpa'} "bedroom" ["sleep(v) room(n)"] that either violate the rules as we
know them or try to deduce root meanings we haven't been told of.  Dangerous stuff.
A lot of them also get the word order wrong for the intended meaning.  I don't see
{pIQpum} "waterfall" working at all; can "fall" take a direct object?  Not likely.

A couple completely miss the mark (pun intended): {DoDnav} "paper map" seems to want
{DoD} to mean some sort of navigational chart, but I think it's just a separator for
the two parts of a heading or bearing in three-dimensional space.  For example,
"Set course 111 mark 14."  And {SoQwI'} "lid, cover" says to me "that which is covered"
instead of "that which causes [something] be covered."

As I've said before, I believe that we should focus less on translating *words*
and concentrate more on translating *ideas*.  Figuring out how to say "dining room"
is only half the challenge.  Figuring out how to make someone *understand* that you
said "dining room" (without coming right out and telling them) is the really glorious
part of it all.

-- ghunchu'wI'

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